I Am Not a Good Man
by yahnu96
Summary: Shepard has more than a few demons within him, and they're not going down easily. In fact, he may just help them grow. Colonist/Earthborn mixed, Torfan 2178, rated for a fair amount of gore/language.


_I am not a good man_.

Good men did not run amok in their youth for two years, rising up the ranks of a street gang on a staircase of bodies and drug runs, even if your family had been slaughtered when you were sixteen. Good men did not unquestioningly follow every order that they were given, no matter how foul or insane. Good men did not kill one of their own flesh and blood, neither the blood of the family nor the blood of the Marines.

As Shepard absently considered the glowing tip of his overheated, blood-caked pistol, he realized – for the first time ever – that he truly was not a good man. He was astonished at this discovery, but couldn't imagine why. It had always been pretty obvious.

His platoon sergeant, Staff Sergeant Lovell, lay on the dirty bunker floor with a hole in his chest that vaguely resembled the stuff they got served in the canteen sometimes, which in turn vaguely resembled hamburger meat. Though the late Staff Sergeant Lovell in all his fresh, organic (_what would make a human organic_? Shepard wondered) glory would probably taste better than that shit.

Shepard chuckled then grimaced at his own morbidity. Sometimes, in the twilit hours in the barracks when he had time to himself – time to think – he would become sick at the thought of everything that he'd done in his short life up until Torfan. The people he'd killed, for ambition or in defense, the ruin that he was responsible for after he'd been rescued from Mindoir and started skulking on the streets of Boston, Earth. His recollections would get so bad at times that he would dry retch horribly as the old, half-forgotten stench and sight of the colony settlement he'd grown up in came back to him, along with all the dead, rotting faces that Shepard had seen… and caused.

But, curiously, he had never – up until shooting Sgt. Lovell at point blank range – considered himself to be… well, not a bad man, but not a "not good man". It sounded confusing, the words chasing each other through his head like that, and they were muddled even more by the gunfire and screaming of batarian and human throats alike outside. The whole damn moon smelled like a big fuckin' barbeque, with a heady dose of gasoline and excrement.

He breathed deeply of the semi-fresh air that remained in this bunker then stepped outside and into No Man's Land, tucking his pistol into its slot on his armor.

Shepard hadn't really wanted to kill Sgt. Lovell, but they'd had a dramatic disagreement over the course of the mission and he felt it necessary to take action. While the Alliance was wasting time and resources bombing the shit out of where they _thought_ the batarians were dug in – to little effect – Shepard's unit and others were getting hit hard where the batarians actually _were_. Their platoon leader, Lieutenant Mathers, had already bit the bullet – or ten bullets, or a grenade, if you're picky – and was currently in pieces all over the killing field. Major Kyle was running all over Creation doing God knew what, his insane mutterings coming every now and then over the comm until some sharp whip in one of the command ships cut him off. Then _all _the Alliance channels had gone down. Sgt. Lovell's face had gone puke-green and piss-yellow all at once when his impending mortality became clear and he ordered his men to retreat.

"Fuck this," he'd muttered, then shouted, "We're getting the fuck out of here, boys! Move back!"

Not realizing at the time that his platoon sergeant had intended a full retreat, Shepard had pulled back with the rest of his unit and held tight in a beat-to-shit bunker that was more bullet holes than walls, probably.

But then, things took a turn for the worse. Well, maybe just for Sgt. Lovell.

Shepard had approached him, pistol still warm and in hand from the recent fighting. "When are we going back out, Sergeant?"

"What the fuck are you talking about, Corporal?" the sick-looking man had spat, glaring. He looked ready to either vomit or cry; Shepard wasn't sure which. "We're not going back. We're sitting this shit out until the brass gets their heads out their asses and lifts off from this fucking rock."

"We need to finish the mission, sir," Shepard had replied calmly. Quietly. Sgt. Lovell narrowed his eyes before turning to the rest of the unit and ordering everyone outside – except for Shepard.

"Now you listen, and you listen close, _Corporal_," the sergeant hissed. "The airheads safely flying high in the fucking skies right now got us into this whole goddamn mess on purpose. They're throwing everything at the batarians they can scrape up – sure, it's for Elysium, sure, it's for Mindoir and all the other colonies they've fucked in the ass, but the only thing that any of us are gonna get if we keep following this goddamn train of bullshit is a hole in the head. It's suicide out there.

"I repeat; we are staying. In the fucking. Bunker. Do you read me, Corporal?"

That's when Shepard had brought up his pistol and shot the sergeant, the discharge enough to overheat the already hot weapon. He didn't flinch, only blinking once to stop any blood from getting into his eyes. He stood quietly for a few seconds, contemplating his own morality, before deciding that it was pretty damn obvious that he didn't actually have any and should just roll with it.

After going outside, another squad leader – Corporal Chen, he thought – ran up to him, wide-eyed.

"Shepard, what happened? We heard a shot –"

"Staff Sergeant Lovell was determined to be in violation of a direct order given by the Systems Alliance military leadership and was summarily executed," Shepard recited. All was quiet, except the continuous sounds of bloodshed in the distance.

"Shepard… you sonofa_bitch,_" Chen muttered.

He ignored that. "Any questions? No? Good." He raised his voice so everyone present could hear. "Gather up your squads, we're moving out. Follow me."

The assault of Torfan, 2178, would go down in history. He would make sure of that.

The dark planet hung in Torfan's sky like a vibrant death's head. An omen, maybe. Or a stamp of approval from some dark, forgotten galactic god that yet dreamed horrific fantasies in the depths of its eternal slumber.

Major Kyle was actually a pretty slick guy, Shepard had decided, his eyes sliding away from the planet that Torfan orbited. _When he's not muttering to himself or shooting shit that isn't there_, he amended. _Guess he broke a little in the brain area._

It had started as a textbook assault with Shepard at the forefront, but it had soon turned into a mad dash for the objective – the main enemy base where the majority of their force was held up – blowing the batarians to shit and treading on them as they fell, tripping over splintered limbs and slipping on innards and a slurry of fluids. The bodies grew more and more numerous, humans and batarians falling left and right, almost in sync, it had seemed. It was almost hard to tell who was on which side.

Finally, at the opposite end of the Killing Field (Shepard reckoned that it deserved to be capitalized), he and the remaining 1/4th or so of his unit – all that was left from his brutal charge, much to their anger and despair and to his indifference, as he hadn't had a mark on him – ran into the previously elusive Major Kyle, who was actually sitting right in the open, navel-gazing placidly like there wasn't a carpet of a few hundred half-burnt corpses in his vicinity. Not that elusive after all.

But he wasn't that hard to get up and moving again, acting almost rational and clear-headed. _Almost_. For a time.

Between the good Major wasting several clips of ammo on thin air and periodically raving into his dead comm unit, Shepard soon realized that _almost _sane wasn't really going to cut it, but by then it was too late; he needed every man. They were right outside the main batarian base – its forward guards and scouts dealt with – and it was time to bring down the axe, the hammer, and any other blunt instrument that existed, metaphorically speaking.

Using a quick application of enough explosives to probably blow a chunk off of the moon if they were properly placed, the heavy door to the compound was quickly and thoroughly disposed of in a blast of ear-drum rupturing, jaw-clacking glory. Shepard, though his ears were now a tad off-kilter, reveled in the spectacle; he could taste the objective, through the tangy smoke and bitter metallic hints in the air. So close.

His remaining troops flooded into the compound like a frantic, lunatic wave of death, cutting down the enemy left and right, moving rapidly from cover to cover, lighting up the dim hallways in explosions of gunfire and screaming. Shepard soon ran emptied his pistol and, having no time to scavenge for clips, unhooked his fully-loaded shotgun and lay waste to any who came within its range. It was heavily modded, and blew the batarians to pieces, sending gooey lumps of blood and gristle and hard chips of bone flying in all directions. He and his men were covered in gore, Major Kyle most of all, whose dark face was held in a permanent rictus grin. Somehow, his teeth were bare of blood.

_For the record, _Shepard thought as he calmly smashed in what he thought might be a female's face with the butt of his gun, _Batarians don't taste very good._

Was he hungry now? _Damn. I should never have thought of food, just keys in the fucking appetite. _He imagined the smell of cooking meat, but didn't have to reach far into his mind to find it; the charred corpses, still smoking from the original explosion and consequent gunfire, helped stimulate his imaginings.

Finally, they had reached the command center.

Shepard, still unscathed by the violence, busted open the flimsy, old door himself with a few well-placed Sledgehammer rounds. He stepped through the rising dust, shotgun raised, his paltry group of men behind him.

He frowned. An unexpected sight lay before him.

"They're… surrendering?" came a soft voice behind him, no doubt Nayemi. If he wasn't mistaken, she happened to be the last female in his unit.

_They look just like the ones on Mindoir..._

Seven batarians had lain their weapons down in plain view, out of their own reach, and they were out of armor, their sinewy arms held up in a universal sign of surrender.

"Humans, we surrender," the one in front said, stepping slowly forward. His four eyes glittered in the half-darkness, grossly alien. Shepard kept his shotgun at full readiness position, though he noticed a couple of the others lowering their own weapons slightly.

"Horse shit," Shepard muttered. He had extensively researched the batarian race after Mindoir had gone up in flames, and knew a great deal about their psyche; it was probable that this was a trick. "Three of you-" he said, pointing to his men, "-go and search them. Make it quick and thorough. Don't let your guard down."

Three moved to obey and patted down the batarians – none too gently or politely – finishing within a couple of minutes. They were clean. In the weapons sense, that is; this room smelled positively rank with alien sweat and leftover food.

"Shepard – ah, sir," Corporal Chen cut in – _oh wow, he's still alive, look at that –_ his voice halting slightly due to confusion over what rank Shepard really was now, "They're all clear. We should take them in. You can… put the gun down."

He considered this like someone would consider a difficult math problem, eyebrows furrowed, hatred and the urge to kill boiling inside of him. He stared at the would-be prisoners, wishing that he could radio somebody of higher rank and ask their opinion, but the channels were still down. There was Major Kyle, of course, but – Shepard turned to look behind him – actually, there wasn't a Major Kyle. He'd either gone down in the firefight or disappeared somewhere to stare at his boots again. _Goddamnit_.

The group of batarians looked right back at Shepard, their grotesque faces unreadable. These men… these _aliens _had butchered and enslaved God knew how many individuals, human and other, including his own kin. Some were family of people that he'd known; almost everyone knew someone who knew someone that had been taken and never seen again. They deserved to burn for all of eternity, if there was a Hell in the human sense or the batarian sense. However, there was a certain degree of mercy expected from a sentient being like Shepard himself, as well as a chance that they would be executed by the Alliance. He slowly began to lower his gun, gritting his teeth.

It never reached his holster. The shotgun flew right back up when the head batarian ever so slowly tilted his head to the right – a cultural sign of disrespect, probably given only because, well, what were the chances of some random Alliance grunt having thoroughly researched batarian culture? – and showed a little grin full of rotted, needle-like teeth.

In a matter of seconds, Shepard aimed the spray of shot at his knees and went straight to taking down the others without even watching to see if the first batarian fell.

Shouting broke out as his men tried to catch him, but Shepard was too fast – he leapt forward, throwing the shotgun aside and landing on the head batarian's chest – _still alive, just screaming, that's good – _and immediately gouged out all four of his eyes at once. It was like shoving his fingers into a misshapen bowling ball that was full of chunky melon. Also, the bowling ball screamed very, very nicely.

By the time he was pulled off, the batarian was dead, his eyes reduced to four ruined, leaking puddles, forever barring his way into the afterlife as his people saw it. Shepard barely had the chance to grin satisfactorily before his own troops beat him to unconsciousness.

When he awakened in a spotless med-bay, Shepard had been expected an immediate discharge, or a firing squad. Something, anything would have been less shocking – even to someone of his accepting, roll with the tides nature – than being granted the Star of Terra.

His "field execution", as the brass called it, of Sgt. Lovell went overlooked and even congratulated. Shepard's mad assault had set in motion the exodus of batarians from the entire sector. He had done "the right thing".

Of course there were psych evals; many of them. But he hadn't really changed, nor did he feel different. In fact, he couldn't really say that he'd even really learned anything from the near-apocalyptic experience.

Major Kyle was unfortunately a total loss, and he was better off being honorably discharged than remaining in the military.

Along with the Star of Terra, Shepard had been granted his officer's commission. He would soon be shipped off to the academy to qualify. Who knew what could be next – maybe even an N7 commission, if he was lucky.

Amidst all the vid exposure and the interviews and the nights spent recuperating, one thought haunted his mind, even more than the growing impression that his family wasn't truly avenged and never would be. One lasting impression of Torfan that he would carry with him for a long, long time, one thing that would slowly come to shape him in the years following, no matter how hard he tried to fight it or ignore it.

_I am not a good man_.


End file.
